All You've Got is Yourself

Theme song: Isolation

One of the most important things I learned from my daughter's death is that, at the end of the day, all you've got is yourself.

What I mean is, your happiness, what makes your life meaningful, cannot come from any external person or thing. That's it.

I'll only say more because maybe you need a little proof. Or maybe you'd like a little poetry to go with this truth, a little comfort to help wash it down.

So I'll say this: What I'm telling you, that all you've got is yourself, is not bad news. If it's true for you, it's also true for everyone else you know--no matter how rich, healthy, pretty, successful, or smart they may seem. If you are human, you are available for every human suffering and condition. This includes the reality of your aloneness.

Before I make it too easy, I'll make it a little more complicated: Just because all you've got is yourself, it doesn't mean that you don't need other people and things to survive and make good in our phenomenal world. You will need food, a warm enough place to sleep, and yes--human love. Everything about your aloneness is true-not-true. But don't let this become an excuse for not coming to terms with the truth.

Because even as you need those things ultimately you cannot control them and so they do not form anything you can hold onto.

The most straightforward way out is to accept your aloneness. Learn to tolerate it. Hold still. Do not grab a beer, your credit card, the remote, or the woman next to you.

Feel the feelings wash over you and through you and you will see they radiate and dissipate. Now you are free to create happiness and meaning from their only true source.

{photo credit: rich_f28}